


Seven

by Swabilliant



Series: Minimal Infinities (Flash fiction pieces) [1]
Category: Original Work
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-28
Updated: 2020-12-28
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:15:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28387644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Swabilliant/pseuds/Swabilliant
Summary: After fossil fuels have run out, this poorly formatted short "poem" describes a few fleeting minutes in the life of a boy interested in relics of the past that once was, forced to collect them in scarce secrecy.
Series: Minimal Infinities (Flash fiction pieces) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2079060





	Seven

Though hard it may be for you, a 21st century dweller to understand, I am going to introduce you to something. This you may find foreign, nay, alien, especially relevant to that of your expectations of society. In the future, things will change, depending on your actions. Everything you do will lead up to something that you can choose, yet, paradoxically, always was going to have been chosen. It is a future some may find bleak, some may find well, some may toil in disbelief at the prospect of such a place. The future, however, that will be described in this text, is definite, but only if you choose it to be. Or rather, will always had been going to choose it to be.

On a cracked asphalt slab is stood a young man. Tall, slender, a messy hairstyle, and some grease up to his arms. He is not quite here right now, for he is gaping at the architecture above. Right triangular buildings, white, with hemispherical, reinforced windows stand taller than a hundred mammoths stacked on end. Their structure seems to bend as the curvature of the earth. From their hypotenuse, pairs are connected via immensely thick steel beams. The towers seem impossibly high, yet they still stand strong in fierce wind fighting them with a brisk sword slash against the exterior hull, perhaps once for every minute.

OK, enough of that. The boy looks down to the broken rock below his feet. There is a plain burlap sack that is full of rusted treasures of the past. Puddles reminiscent of ancient reserves of oil are scattered upon the age-old, dead turf. This place is clearly in disrepair, but it does not matter. Who uses roads anymore?

The boy ties the sack shut and slings it around his shoulder, about to head back to his block, block seven. If he is caught out here, he will be executed or enlisted into the militia if his skills are deemed worthy enough to be used. The chances of this are slim: for one, he is only slightly skilled in ancient automotive repairs, and very simple, binary based computing. And to add to that, he is not yet old enough to be enlisted in the militia. Not that either of these matter, for they rarely patrol anymore. This sector can only be accessed by highly ranked officials, or maintenance men who work for the raw material and service side of the planet. This entire half is enlisted only for those who are not yet of age to serve to reside.

Back at his block, the door is ajar. It isn't supposed to open under normal circumstances, but corners were cut in constructing these earlier cells and simple, binary computational systems were used for locking mechanisms. It was easy to break.

He slips into the door with his bag of relics past and reality appears to warp as he climbs tall, geometrical stairs as the sharply cornered interior becomes more and more clean and he approaches absolute.

His room can be described as messy. Rusted parts and half built engines are strewn about the otherwise barely touched interior. I should fix this, I should fix that. What's it matter? He has not accurately sized parts yet. He can only work off approximations for that which cannot be located in preserved ancient texts. He is lucky, lucky that he lives in block seven. It is right on the edge of the residence space that nearly all the planet has been allocated for. He can pillage ruins that are decades old, to find treasures to adorn his room with. It seems that no others share his interests, but then, how could they know of these ancient machines? It is a miracle he has not yet been culled for his discoveries. Most surveillance in these older blocks is neglected, as the complete edge of landmass on this side of the residency allocation is only a couple miles long.

Even in his exploration of the past, he still is questing for something greater. A revolution. An uprising. Networks have been established, alliances gained, broken, tested, defined. There are others. In every building, there are others. But it was him and a small few who have put the effort of uniting their minds in cables of data streamed, hung clotheslines, open windows, shattered glass. Ideas, thoughts, dialogue, exchanged. All of it is there, in the wires. In the bits, bytes, the data. Interpreters, translators, spoken word, text. Communication. Simple in design, complex in possibility, limitless in potential. Gold. It is done, his will, their combined strength, to destroy, to conquer, to fix, to mend the society that once was.

Roads and tunnels of fiber optic, of transferred information, they hang from building to building, connecting the disconnected. Ancient binary machines are simple in function but adequate enough to establish what might be considered equivalent to being in the same room as another. They can send and receive text. A simple program was written and is executed by the boy, It is used to connect them, via text. Text is a powerful tool. Ideas change mindsets. Information forms power. Wielded and used, in effect, by the beholder, the transmitter, the receiving end, eyes scanning symbols on pixels of a screen, lit up in strange patterns signifying speech.

This is the last remaining hope for them.


End file.
